I really want to love Linux. I’m part of that growing crowd of users who are genuinely fed up with Microsoft’s predatory practices and the feeling that I no longer own my own OS. (for reference, i have a RTX 2070, Ryzen 5700, ASUS rog board). After a while searching, I came to bazzite, and it crashed many times while installing. then i found Pop!_OS because it was advertised as a "Stable Release" with the new COSMIC interface—the perfect landing spot for a gamer moving from Windows. installing it was a breeze, yay!

I didn’t expect perfection, but I didn't expect to become an unpaid beta tester.

I’ve installed Linux distros across the last 15 years like every couple years (from red hat back in 1998 to Mint 3 years ago), so I’m not a total novice, but I’m a "regular gamer" now. I have a limited amount of time to relax after work, and I don't want to spend it in a terminal or troubleshooting "stable" software just to play a match.

My experience in a week of Pop!_OS (January 2026 stable release):

• The Desktop vs. My Mouse: I spent days fighting a bug where the camera in my games was literally hijacked. The OS and the game were fighting for control of the mouse, snapping my view back to the center every second.
• The Invisible Game: I had games running where I could hear the sound, but the window simply vanished from the desktop—not in Alt-Tab, not in the menu. Just a ghost process.
• The Hardware Fight: My USB DAC/EQ setup, which works instantly on Windows, became a source of constant frustration. COSMIC or Wayland (or both) seemed to fight every attempt to tweak my sound until I eventually just bought physical EQ hardware to bypass the OS entirely.
• The Final Straw: After a full day of "fixing" things just to play a 3D game like not being able to move the camera with the mouse, etc. (not even something heavy like Cyberpunk on Ultra settings), I got a crash in my very first match.

I sympathize with the movement, and I see the stats—Linux gaming is at an all-time high of 3.58% on Steam, and it’s clearly evolving. But from the perspective of a guy who just wants to turn on his PC and play, it still feels like the "stable" label is being used very differently in Linux than it is in Windows. Am I setting the expectations too high? i got hyped with so many claims everywhere. I want to try again in the near future. But for now, albeit momentarily (i hope), I sadly surrender to Bill Gates and retreat in defeat to enjoy my little free time as a gamer, not a debugger.

Is Linux actually ready for a user like me? Or is the "stable" label on these new releases just marketing?

submitted by /u/Juceror
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With the Steam Frame and Steam Machine launching with SteamOS Linux this year, we're going to again see a nice boost for Flatpaks and desktop Linux overall.

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Read the full article on GamingOnLinux.

submitted by /u/ThinkTourist8076
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just have a question to users with experience; are your fps numbers different between windows vs linux? i used to have an X3D chip and i never could get the smoothness similar to windows. i wanted to see if other people were having issues because im in the market for a cpu upgrade and wondering if i should just go 9900X instead of X3D. thank you.

edit: my main game is heavily cpu bound and wondering if the translation layer affects caching somehow

submitted by /u/Legitimate-Trust4288
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Kingdoms and Castles was great, and Nova Roma is shaping up to be a great city-builder but the developers at Lion Shield need more time to get it right.

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Read the full article on GamingOnLinux.

So AFAIK VRR (variable refresh rate) means the refresh rate of the display can vary according to the frames per second of the game that you're playing, right? But if I disable that, then my monitor will run at a locked 144Hz and 144fps. But what happens if a game is not able to run with that many FPS? Will it run at 60fps and the monitor at 60Hz when it's supposed to run at 144Hz? Why do some people think VRR is essential for gaming on Linux and some don't? Somebody please explain.

submitted by /u/untrained9823
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Always nice to see an indie success story, with Schedule I developer TVGS expanding the team as work goes on towards mod support.

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How does it work, can you drag and drop files like on Windows, are there any mod managers made for Linux? Or will I need to give up modding if I switch over completely to Linux.

submitted by /u/IGetHugee
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Game publisher Hooded Horse have recently revealed another two titles with Bosslords and Architect of Ruin that looks awesome, as they fight against AI "art".

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On vocation menu the game freezes. I tried looking things up. I already changed wine config to win 11. Apparently for some people increasing the swap fixed it, for me it did not. Anybody knows a fix?

I'm on bazzite with a 9700x and 7800xt.

submitted by /u/TheFeri
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Minecraft has a new testing build out that ups the cute factor by a lot, with an overhaul of various baby mobs and you get pet nametags now too.

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Read the full article on GamingOnLinux.

On top of SteamOS 3.7.20 Beta and improvements to the Steam Workshop so mods can support multiple game versions, we have a Beta UI overhaul for Steam games.

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Read the full article on GamingOnLinux.

Valve have released SteamOS 3.7.20 Beta coming with just two changes, and one of them is very interesting to see arrive on SteamOS.

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Read the full article on GamingOnLinux.

So I and my wife were trying to get her XBox-like controller working on linux, specifically a Tutrle Beach Afterglow wired controller on Ubuntu. After some work with Claude Code it came up with the below which worked for me on multiple Ubuntu systems. As I could not find this help online anywhere I thought I would post it here

Claude:
Instructions for Setting Up the Controller on Another PC

Prerequisites

- Ubuntu/Debian-based Linux system

- USB connection for the controller

- Internet connection

- Sudo/root access

Step-by-Step Installation

1. Install required packages:

   sudo apt-get update

   sudo apt-get install -y dkms cabextract linux-headers-$(uname -r) git

2. Download the xone driver:

   cd /tmp

   git clone https://github.com/medusalix/xone

   cd xone

3. Install the xone driver:

   sudo ./install.sh

4. Unload the default xpad driver and load xone:

   sudo rmmod xpad 2>/dev/null

   sudo modprobe xone-wired

5. Make the change permanent (prevent xpad from loading on boot):

   echo "blacklist xpad" | sudo tee /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist-xpad.conf

   echo "xone-wired" | sudo tee -a /etc/modules

6. Plug in your controller

7. Test the controller:

   # Check if controller is detected

   ls -la /dev/input/js0

   # Test button presses (press buttons while this runs)

   sudo apt-get install -y evtest

   evtest /dev/input/event16

   (The event number may vary - use ls /dev/input/event* and check /proc/bus/input/devices to find the right one)

   Why This Works

   The default xpad driver doesn't properly initialize your Turtle Beach Afterglow controller because it needs GIP (Gaming Input Protocol) initialization commands. The xone driver has full GIP support and properly authenticates with the controller, allowing it to send input events.

   Troubleshooting

   If the controller still doesn't work:

   - Verify xone is loaded: lsmod | grep xone

   - Check kernel messages: dmesg | tail -30

   - Ensure xpad is blacklisted: lsmod | grep xpad (should return nothing)

submitted by /u/willmansfield
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I've been driving myself crazy over the last two weeks with this. I spent a long time validating my hardware on Windows first. I ran almost all the standard memory/CPU stress tests: Prime95 (Large FFT), y-cruncher, HCI Memtest, and TM5. I tested both default JEDEC settings and my EXPO profile, and nothing threw a single error.

Once I was sure the hardware was stable, I wiped Windows and installed Arch. I ran y-cruncher overnight just to be extra sure everything was stable. It ran for 12+ hours straight, but then immediately failed the moment I woke up my monitor.

I can reproduce this consistently. It happens even if I revert to stock and use the JEDEC profile. However, it does not occur if I hook my monitor up to the iGPU instead of the 9070 XT. I also tested on a minimal Debian install with no Desktop Environment (where the display never times out), and y-cruncher never failed there either.

I also briefly tried to reproduce this on a laptop with a Ryzen 7840HS and 780M (RDNA 3), and it didn't fail there, so it seems specific to the desktop or the newer architecture.

Some Googling led me to this Mesa issue (https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/mesa/mesa/-/issues/14313) and this thread on the CachyOS forum (https://discuss.cachyos.org/t/turning-on-monitor-causes-cpu-to-fail-y-cruncher/18599). The common link I'm seeing is that everyone reporting this seems to be on AM5 with a Zen 5 processor and an RDNA 4 GPU.

I'm on Arch using KDE with everything fully up to date (Kernel 6.18.3 and Mesa 25.3.3).

Specs: Ryzen 5 9600X B850M Mortar 32GB DDR5 (KF560C30BBEAK2-32) RX 9070 XT

Does anyone have any ideas what could be causing this or any potential solutions?

submitted by /u/diyonysius
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I really don't want to go back to Windows, so I hope there is a fix.

I have an RTX 5080. Running Bazzite.

All games on either the monitor (connected via DP) and the TV (HDMI 2.1) run smoothly if the game is at 120fps (monitor and TV both are 120Hz).

However, whenever the game drops frame rates, or I cap it below 120fps (example, 90fps), there is a camera judder that is quite severe, pointing towards a failure of VRR.

I have set VRR enabled in Gamescope as well as in the Display settings for both the displays. The judder also happens in Desktop Environment.

I am not sure what to do and if this fixable, but I am hoping someone knows and can help me solve it. The thought of going back to Windows is dreadful as VRR is essential.

submitted by /u/OMG_NoReally
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submitted by /u/Loud_Economics_9477
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Is there a such thing as a "wrong" distro?

I often see this statement on many Linux forums:

"Why would you choose [current distro]? Its sucks, change to [another distro] instead."

I'm honestly tired that people offer this as a "solution" to a problem.

submitted by /u/ElectricalPanic1999
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I'm trying to get preset M to work with Witcher 3 but struggling with my setup... should have just bought on Steam it seems...

Anyway... that aside, I think I have successfully updated the DLL to 4.5 with DLSS Updater but now I'm trying to set the M preset.

It seems that in Steam I was able to do that with this launch command which shows the debug overlay as well: DXVK_NVAPI_DRS_NGX_DLSS_SR_OVERRIDE_RENDER_PRESET_SELECTION=render_preset_m DXVK_NVAPI_SET_NGX_DEBUG_OPTIONS=DLSSIndicator=1024 %command%

But I'm unsure how to apply this via Heroic.

I tried setting these variables in the settings for the game in Heroic here:

https://preview.redd.it/57luf1srm9cg1.png?width=669&format=png&auto=webp&s=5c60a659ee919cc988922a3e0e7110abf9e76f87

The first variable does seem to have enabled the debug overlay:

DXVK_NVAPI_SET_NGX_DEBUG_OPTIONS = DLSSIndicator=1024

But this second variable doesn't seem to be able to enforce preset M as per the overlay when I'm in-game.

DXVK_NVAPI_SET_NGX_DLSS_PRESET = M

submitted by /u/Reynbou
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I already have tried that thing where you make a cfg files that tells steam to use more threads but that did nothing and that is the only solution anybody mentions anywhere.

submitted by /u/Either_Main9636
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